Jean Tinnea writes:

I’ll be on King 5 news tonight in an interview about The Corner: 23rd & Union, the art/history/interview project. Also interviewed Jenny Asarno, the project creator, and Saviour Knowledge plus others…..at last, a positive story on the CD. 

Update – Jean Tinnea writes:

I’ll be on King 5 news tonight in an interview about The Corner: 23rd & Union, the art/history/interview project. Also interviewed Jenny Asarno, the project creator, and Saviour Knowledge plus others…..at last, a positive story on the CD. 

(looks like Jean Tinnea)

(2 pictures > 2,000 words)

Everyone seems enthusiastic about a CD Election Forum, and several people even want to help organize it.

I suggest those interested in creating an election forum attend this month’s Central Area District Council meeting ( 6PM , Thursday, Douglass Truth Library), invite the Council to sponsor the event, and organize a group to plan it (see comments on previous post for some smart ideas). I’m trying to contact the Chair, Tenaya Wright, to suggest it as an agenda item. If the District Council isn’t interested, we can huddle and organize outside.

Election in brief:

• Mayor: 8 candidates
• Council position 2 (Conlin incumbent) 2 candidates: they skip the primary, should we skip them?
• Council position 4: 6 candidates
• Council position 6 (Licata incumbent): 3 candidates
• Council position 8: 6 candidates
• Seattle School Board Director District 5 (district voting in Primary, Citywide in General election): 4 candidates

A few personal thoughts: 27 people to listen to! I suggest a July (18th or 25th) Saturday morning event at (say) Garfield, and advertise time-slots for each race. One minute statement, 2 questions/candidate runs at least 2 1/2 hours. 

The filing deadline for this Fall’s election was Friday, and the Primary is on August 18th.  An article in the Seattle Times has lists of the candidates.  The legislature changed the date of the primary last year (used to be in September)  – it’s going to be awkward organizing a candidate forum during the Summer. The City Neighborhood Council is having a City Council Candidate Night on June 18th (flyer attached): you get to question the candidates one-on-one (if you and they turn up early) but not during the forum.

Question: do we want to organize a neighborhood-wide candidate forum sometime before the Primary? Let me know ([email protected] and/or via comments here) if you’re a) interested and/or b) willing to help organize it. Any thoughts on a joint CD/ Capitol Hill Candidate Night?

Local Interest:

School Board

Incumbent Mary Bass, who represents Central Seattle, has three challengers: Joanna Cullen, a self-employed writer and editor and 2001-03 president of the Seattle Council PTSA; Andre Helmstetter, co-owner of MezzaLuna Bistro and parent who protested the decision to close T.T. Minor Elementary; and Kay Smith-Blum, co-owner of Butch Blum clothing store and organizer of a large 2004 fundraiser for school music programs.

General Interest:

Mayor: 

Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels seeks a third term, his challengers include a longtime City Council ally, a former Sonic, and a cellphone executive who has put $200,000 of his own money into the race.

Remember that the incumbent (Paul Schell) was eliminated in the 2001 Primary.

City Council: Two open seats (Drago and McIver retiring), Licata and Conlin running for “their” seats.

The candidates filing for Drago’s Position 4 were Sally Bagshaw, a former head of the King County prosecutor’s civil division; housing advocate David Bloom; Brian Carver, an Amazon.com manager and community organizer; Iraq war veteran Dorsol Plants; and Thomas Tobin. Renter Joshua Caple, who runs an adult day-health program, filed an insufficient filing-fee petition, according to the county.

Position 8, held by McIver, has six candidates: Seattle Department of Transportation employee Bobby Forch; tree activist David Miller; local Sierra Club chairman Mike O’Brien; landlord and three-time candidate Robert Rosencrantz; former city employee Jordan Royer, whose father, Charles Royer, is a former Seattle mayor; and musician Rusty Williams, whose late mother was a longtime City Council member.

(all excerpts from Seattle Times article)

(received this via the East Precinct Crime Prevention Coalition list. Not clear why this group is trying to organize a march at exactly the same time as the Juneteenth parade which happens every year!) 

Thanks to everybody who has participated in the planning process so far. Our next meeting is set for next Thursday (6/4) 7pm at the Rainier Vista Boys and Girls Club. I’ll keep information about the June 20th march/rally up to date here <http://tinyurl.com/oqty4c> :

• Territory & the March/Rally Location – We spent the first half of the meeting discussing the difficulty of getting kids from the South End and Central Area together at Sam Smith park, an area understood to be CD territory. We talked about several different ways similar problems had been addressed in the past, like having an event at a place outside of any claimed territory. We agreed that the most promising strategies for overcoming this problem will take longer than the 3 weeks we have to get the march together. We agreed that we’ll be successful in overcoming the territory problem for the march to the extent we have kids doing the planning, strategizing, and outreach.
• Outreach – the most important thing we’ll being doing in the next two weeks is getting the word out to kids in the Central Area, the South End, Seatac, Tukwila, West Seattle. Angela, Tamra, Denise, John, Franklyn, Sarah, and Kim all volunteered to hand out fliers. I’ll send out an e-mail by Monday morning to get this organized.

   

  • We talked about handing out fliers at schools (Franklin, Foster, Rainier Beach, Garfield) at 23rd/Union, 23rd/Jackson, door-to-door along parade route, at businesses near parade route, at community centers.
  • E-mail [email protected] ASAP if you need fliers and I’ll make every effort to hook you up ASAP.

     

• Police Coordination Along the Parade Route – Officer Shin of the East Precinct attended and explained to us that there will be a Juneteenth parade at the same time a couple of blocks away in the Central Area. This will stretch police resources thin in the East Precinct. We will need to have a minimum of 250 people at either march site for marchers to occupy the streets. If there are less, we will use the sidewalks, with police blocking side street intersections as we pass them along our route. Since we want to have maximum visibility/impact, I think we should move mountains to get 250 people at both marches.
• Other Stuff – if outreach is not your bag, there are plenty of other ways you can help in the next three weeks. We’re going to need people to pick up donated food/equipment, set up and take down the rally, cook hot dogs, and all manner of other tasks. The call for other volunteers will come out in the next two weeks – please be ready to jump in and help.
• Mother’s Outreach Movement (M.O.M.) will be screening “Bastards of the Party <http://www.hbo.com/docs/programs/bastardsoftheparty/synopsis.html> ,” a documentary about the roots of Los Angeles gang culture, in the Central Area on June 5th and the South End on June 6th. E-mail Liz Ali ([email protected]) for more info.

  Thanks again everybody for helping to make this event happen. With all this energy and commitment, if we don’t watch out we’re going to end up doing some good. Best,

206-601-5646

John Hoole ([email protected])

(Meeting Announcement)

 Happy Summer, East Precinct Neighbors!

Several of you have had expressed interest in regard to the Seattle Youth Violence Prevention Initiative. As you may know, $7.8 million dollars has been approved to provide opportunities, resources and supports for vulnerable youth to move toward positive activities and reduce violent crime. 

With strict accountability standards, the Seattle Youth Violence Prevention Initiative’s success will be measured by “whether neighborhoods and schools are safer, and whether individual lives are transformed as measured by indicators, such as school performance and recidivism.” 

Our next EPCPC meeting will focus specifically on this initiative.  Our special guests will be Doug Carey, City of Seattle Department of Finance, Mariko Lockhart, Director. Seattle Youth Violence Prevention Initiative, and Jamila Taylor, the Urban League’s Youth Violence Prevention Initiative 
Coordinator.  

I am strongly encouraging you to attend to ask questions and provide suggestions for this initiative.  This is a community driven effort and, although standards and focuses were identified at earlier community based sessions, I believe your continuing input is important. 

As always we will be addressing community concerns, please keep in mind that there may be media representatives present.  If you re uncomfortable speaking, forms will be provided for you to record your concerns confidentially. 

East Precinct Crime Prevention Coalition
Thursday, May 28, 6:30 PM
Seattle Vocational Institute 
2101 South Jackson Street
Seattle 98144

Remember: you can park in the back on the north side of the building, even though there are ‘no parking’ signs.
 
I’ll see you all there!

With best regards, 

Stephanie Tschida, Chair

Alerted by Kerry Murakami (former PI Neighborhoods reporter) to check out the revamped http://seattlepostglobe.org, a blog started by [you guessed it] laid-off Seattle PI staff:

Hi, check out our newly-designed site. We’re the news site started by former P-I journalists.
One of the things we’re able to do is have community members add stories about issues going on, as well as calendar items. 
We really hope to be a vehicle for organizations and activists to get out issues that need discussion in the city, whether it be city-wide or specific to neighborhoods.

Please feel free to submit pieces or blog posts. They’ll go to a hidden holding area where we can review them before they go public.

We’re hoping this sight will be a blend of traditonal journalists, public broadcasting and trusted community members

To do this, go to our site, seattlepostglobe.org 
On the right if you scroll down is an icon that says get published. please click on that, register and follow the instructions. Enter a headline and when you’re done, hit publish at the bottom.

I went to  seattlepostglobe.org and found:

a) that the revamped site starts on Monday!

b) a report from a guy named Scott about a plane landing in Genesee Park. The format of the report was just like those used by CD News’s Scott! Has Scott been cloned? Has he defected? Or is SeattlePostGlobe going to become a sort of super-CD-News for items of Citywide interest.

Update: YEP, it’s our Scott – the link to his name wasn’t live when I first looked, but now identifies him. 

(I do not necessarily endorse these: Andrew) 

Please join us Wednesday, May 6^th at 5:30pm at Kawabe Memorial House, 221 18th Avenue South (just north of Jackson Street, near Washington Middle School) for the Kick-Off of signature gathering for two Seattle City Charter Amendments:

             Seattle Districts Now – modifies City Council from 9 at-large positions to 5 district positions and 4 at-large positions.  The vast majority of large cities have an organizational structure of either all district council positions or a hybrid combination of district and at-large positions.  This amendment is intended to provide Seattle voters will better direct representation.

            Equal Chance for Voters – allows voter sponsored Charter Amendments to go before the voters in every election year.  Currently we are only allowed to present amendments in elections held in odd years.  Let’s empower Seattle voters!

For further information, to download petition copies, or to make a donation go to:  www.actionseattle.org

         NOTE:  This website will have complete amendment information, voter registration links, etc. by Friday morning, May 10^th (it is still under development).

 You may also pick up petiitions in the mailbox at 2817 S McLellan Street.

If you are unable to attend but wish to volunteer or need further information, please contact Pat Murakami at:  206.774.9146  or pat@actionseattle.org